


Frank 'n' Victor

by softchickennolettuce



Category: Frankenstein - Mary Shelley, Rocky Horror Picture Show
Genre: Crack Relationships, Guilt, Karaoke, M/M, Monster mash, Nervousness, One hug, Too Much Smiling, but only for a second, high school musical cameos, random hymn reference, reassurance, uneven tone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-06
Updated: 2021-03-06
Packaged: 2021-03-19 09:09:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29872386
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softchickennolettuce/pseuds/softchickennolettuce
Summary: Frank-N-Furter and Victor Frankenstein bond over the struggles of holding the secret to life itself. Also, karaoke.
Relationships: Victor Frankenstein/Frank N. Furter
Comments: 5
Kudos: 5





	Frank 'n' Victor

Victor Frankenstein and Frank-N-Furter were sitting across from one another at a cafe, discussing the hardships of holding the secret to life itself. They each had plenty to say on the topic and were pleasantly surprised by how much they could empathize with each other’s experiences. Eventually, the conversation turned to the inevitable subject of their creatures.

“Mine was just so  _ hideous _ ,” Victor whined. He knew it was shallow, but the full extent of his creature’s problems pained him to talk about, so he didn’t want to jump right into the serious stuff.

Frank chuckled. “I suppose that’s one thing we don’t have in common. Rocky was  _ wonderful _ . The most beautiful man I could ever hope to see with my own two eyes. He was a vision. A pleasure to behold. A marvel. A feast for the eyes. A-”

“I get the idea,” Victor cut in, not wanting to interrupt but worried that Frank could go on like that forever.

Frank squinted and continued. “He had blond hair and a tan. And muscles galore! And when he smiled…” Frank sighed and traced the patterns on a napkin with his finger. He began to finish his sentence, but he seemed to have trouble conjuring up either his voice or the words, or perhaps both.

Victor sensed a sudden feeling of spellbound sorrow emanating from Frank. It saddened him and made him wonder more about Frank and Rocky’s relationship. Prior to this moment, he was having trouble caring about that particular area of Frank’s life. But now it felt rather poignant. It seemed to have an inexplicable depth, more so than Frank made it sound like it had. He wondered what Rocky’s smile looked like, what the feeling in a room had been like when Frank and Rocky were both there.

But the solemnity on Frank’s face brought Victor back to the conversation, and he tried to think of something to say to distract Frank from missing Rocky, if that’s indeed what he was doing. “Um…” The first thing he thought of felt unhelpful, as it was still about this mysterious muscular man. Victor said it anyway. “But surely he wasn’t  _ all  _ good.”

Frank snapped out of his gloomy ruminations. “That’s true. You know what the worst thing was?”

Victor shook his head.

“He was so ungrateful! He went and cheated on me with that dreadful normie earthling, Janet Weiss. I didn’t make him…” Frank paused dramatically, “for  _ her _ !!”

“Don’t even get me started on creatures being cruel,” Victor warned. “Mine murdered practically everyone whom I cared about! He killed my brother, and when Justine was blamed her life was taken as well; he killed my dear friend Clerval… He even killed my bae.”

Frank raised an eyebrow. “So you’re… unattached?” Not that Victor’s having a significant other would necessarily stop Frank from being interested, but he didn’t know what kind of guy Victor was.

“I suppose so,” Victor said wistfully, thinking of all the dead people he missed. “Why do you ask?” As he awaited an answer, he gazed intently at Frank’s face.

What charming brown eyes he had. What attractive, expressive lips. He simply exuded confidence and desirability.

Frank-N-Furter was one hot dog.

After a long pause, he replied, “Just checking.” It was true, right? Not that Frank had a huge problem with himself lying, but he was enjoying the openness of this conversation - one of the best he’d had in a long, long time - and didn’t feel like sullying it with untruths.

That being said, there was something undeniable that Frank was not ready to tell Victor. Not being ready for something was a foreign feeling to him. But he could tell it would be strange to bring it up yet. “It” being the fact that he was quite attracted to Mr. Frankenstein.

Victor was a sparkling, handsome, hunky man whom Frank supposed was around his age, perhaps a bit younger; although he had the disposition of someone quite older, having endured decades’ worth of stress in a matter of only a few years. He was dressed spiffily and inside his skull was housed one of the greatest brains Frank had ever encountered. Frank was surprised at himself for being attracted to someone’s intelligence, but here he was, internally drooling over Victor’s intellect and wisdom, the precision of his thoughts.

Realizing their conversation had slowed to a halt, Victor cleared his throat strangely. “Sooo… Sorry if I was one-upping you a moment ago. It just pains me so much, all the things my creature did, and to realize that it was ultimately all my fault…” He scowled at himself, not for creating the creature, but for turning their dead dialogue into a pity party for himself. Of course, he couldn’t take it back, and it did feel nicely cathartic to admit these feelings. He just didn’t want to be  _ that guy _ .

“No, no! Nothing to apologize for,” Frank assured him. “Murder is rather an exciting thing to hear about. And… it made me more aware of just how much you’ve been through. My science career hasn’t been a piece of cake either - not in the slightest - but at least Rocky didn’t cause any deaths, not directly, anyway.

“But don’t be silly, saying it was all your fault. I know, I know:  _ you  _ made the creature, but who made his decisions?”

Victor was heartwarmed and shook. He felt differently toward each of the sentences Frank had just spoken, but that last one was something he really needed to hear. After another short silence, he murmured, “Thank you, Frank.”

“Of course, Victor. But seriously - don’t worry about taking over the conversation. I’m sure I’m guilty of it myself. And I really don’t mind.”

It was true. Frank loved to listen to Victor speak. He had such a way with words, and a charming accent Frank was unfamiliar with. It was dissimilar to his own, and to that of people he had met like Brad, Janet, and Eddie. He supposed it bore some similarity to that old fuddy-duddy Dr. Scott’s accent, but not completely; it was hard to compare because their voices were quite different from each other regardless. Victor sounded like anything but a fuddy-duddy.

Although with each stretch of silence they got less and less awkward, Frank wanted to avoid them, so he shook away his thoughts about how dreamy the dreamboat he was sitting across from was and spoke. “Well, what now?”

Victor shrugged slowly, turning to the back wall of the cafe where a man and woman were singing karaoke. They seemed to be close to the end of their song.

Frank gasped gleefully, clasping his hands together. “Do you want to do karaoke??”

“Uh…” Victor didn’t know what to say. “Hang on.”

The singing couple harmonized the last line of their song and stepped off the stage, approaching Victor for some bizarre reason. Well, he supposed he  _ had  _ sorta been staring.

“Hey, you two should totally sing a song,” the woman said, gesturing to include Frank in the sentence.

“What!?” Victor exclaimed, surprised and disturbed by this random stranger telling him what to do. “Why?”

“Gabriella’s right,” the man with her said. “Trust us, we have a history with karaoke. We can spot good karaoke contenders a mile away. You two singing up there would make a killer duet.”

“Wh- you weirdos,” Victor spluttered. “What business do you have butting into our personal space and telling us what we should do?”

“Hey, man, it was just a suggestion,” the strange man said, holding out his hands defensively. “But I think you’d thank us later, if you just gave it a try.”

“We’ve been there,” Gabriella said with a knowing smile and a nod.

Victor just silently squinted back at them, grasping a fork but not pointing it at them. He didn’t want to be threatening; he only wanted to show his annoyance.

Gabriella’s demeanor changed slightly, though she still seemed thoroughly optimistic. “Come on, Troy,” she said, taking her companion’s hand. “Let’s give them some space.” The two walked out of the cafe, talking about hospitals and someone named Jason.

Victor swiveled his torso back to Frank, realizing he hadn’t seen any of the cross-dresser’s reactions to the weird encounter.

Frank looked a bit amused and mysteriously hopeful. He said nothing immediately.

Victor didn’t know what to do. He inelegantly shrugged and laughed mirthlessly. His eyes screamed “help me”.

Concerned for his new friend, Frank spoke. “Those two were rather intrusive, but I saw the way you were looking at the stage. What do you say we do a song?”

“Oh, uh…” Even without the weird pressure from the strangers, Victor felt a bit hesitant, though he was interested. “They probably don’t even have any songs I know. I’m not so hip.”

Frank smirked. “We’ll see about that.” He walked off to check what songs were available.

Upon returning, he sat back down and asked Victor, “Know the song ‘Monster Mash’?”

Victor’s eyes lit up, although he wished they hadn’t. Still, he too valued the honesty between Frank and himself, so he meekly nodded his head.

“Splendid! Won’t you sing it with me?”

Victor felt incredibly conflicted. “Frank, I really would love to. But I’m not much of a singer,” he said bashfully.

“Oh, come now,” Frank said with a reassuring smile, patting Victor’s hand. “You’re a man of such talent. Surely that wouldn’t end at a little thing like singing.”

“I- I’m not sure…” Victor’s face reddened as he awkwardly ducked his head toward his shoulder before peeking up toward Frank’s face.

Frank smiled yet another smile dripping with comfort and joy, comfort and joy, oh tidings of comfort and joy. “Tell you what. I’ll take the first verse and chorus. You can do the backup vocals. Then on the second verse, we can swap. How does that sound?”

The corners of Victor’s lips rose into a toothy grin. “Well… okay.”

Frank looked meaningfully into Victor’s eyes before they stood. “Trust me. You’ll be fabulous. Absolutely smashing.”

Victor felt his heart go b-bmp b-bmp, fluttering as his face grew even warmer. Suddenly it felt harder to breathe, like the air was made of pure happiness fumes. Walking up to the stage felt more like walking on the moon, if the moon was made of marshmallows.

And then suddenly there he was, on the karaoke stage with Frank. Normally he wouldn’t have dared go up there, but this charming extraterrestrial had managed to build up his courage enough for it to happen. Victor still felt nervous, like his throat was closing on itself, but he was excited too. Noticing Frank looking at him, he gave him a quick nod of readiness, and the music started.

“I was working in my lab late one night…” began Frank, already shimmering with charisma.

Victor looked at him in awe. How was this guy so incredibly captivating? And flawless-seeming? Those fluttery feelings flittered back into his chest. He also felt a bit relieved as Frank’s talk-singing reminded him that the majority of the song was spoken word - that should make the whole thing easier for him.

Victor was so wrapped up in his admirative thoughts that he nearly missed his cue. Quickly he snapped back into the moment and sang, “He did the mash!” The call-and-response-iness of the chorus was great fun to sing with Frank, and Victor could feel his nervousness melting away.

Eagerly he took the second verse, with Frank “wah-ooh”ing in the background. As the chorus soon came around again, Victor couldn’t stop himself from smiling widely as Frank sang, “He did the mash!”

“He did the monster mash!” Victor replied, trying to sound spooky and cracking himself up in the process.

The pair of scientists continued on like that for two more minutes, entertaining themselves plenty and gradually getting kookier and kookier with their rendition. 

When the song came to an end and they stepped off the stage, Victor was delighted. Frank was similarly cheery. They skipped back to their table, giggling. Victor laughed so hard that he snorted, prompting even more chuckles from both of them.

They took their seats again as their laughter eventually died down. Victor sighed with contentment, then looked at his watch. His smile began to fade. “I suppose I should be on my way soon, though I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to stay with you.”

Frank softly said, “You could.” It wasn’t really in a clingy way, it sounded more like a dare.

Victor shrugged helplessly. “I know. I could. And perhaps I should, I don’t know. But I have things to take care of, and I want to be responsible, at least for today.”

“All right,” Frank said casually. “Truth be told, that’s quite admirable of you.”

“What is? Trying to be responsible?”

Frank nodded, not elaborating.

Another silent moment passed.

“Thank you for spending time with me, Frank,” Victor said. “It’s been amazing, and fun! And so much more… Plus, uh, I think you’ve helped me to feel more sure of myself today. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Frank said. “It has been fun. And you’re a nice guy.”

Victor grinned. “So are you.” He stood back up, preparing to leave.

Frank stood too, and they left the cafe together before finally parting ways.

Victor couldn’t help himself. He hugged Frank. “I’m going to miss you,” he whispered.

“We’ll just have to see each other again, then, won’t we?” Frank suggested as he patted Victor’s shoulder, unsure what to do. He hadn’t been hugged in a long time.

Victor liked that idea. “I’d love to.”

So after a long embrace, the two of them went off to attend to other areas of their lives; but they did so with a new spark of joy in their hearts, each looking forward to the next time they would hang out and hoping it would be soon.


End file.
